Amenities

[Mithkabob]

I think amenities are okay, although they probably need more balancing. For a hive mind they are pretty boring since it's just a checklist of something you have to build another of at certain population milestones, but it's their balance vs. not having to have consumer goods.

For my megacorp, I just build enough commercial zones to cover my consumer goods needs with the trade policy and that alone generates enough spare energy to never need technicians and enough amenities to not need to build any other amenity buildings. I don't need civilian factories, so I can use the minerals that would have gone to those for more alloy production. And this was with being in a galaxy with entirely spiritualist zealots and megachurches that all hated me so I couldn't even build branch offices for other bonuses.

I plan on trying some other builds out as well, I'm having a lot of fun with the options in this patch, each empire really feels different now.

 

[AlanC9]

You don't.
A clerk produces 2 amenities and 2 TV. In term of amenities in perfect conditions it can provide for one another pop give or take random perk modifier, but needs food, CG and housing. You might break or end with small positive in specific builds, but in others clerks eat more than they provide.

Remember, it's clerks plus administrators, science directors, etc. The clerks alone won't get the job done, but we weren't talking about that.

I suggest you to try to play a gestalt. They use separate buildings for amenities and their costs are right into your face once you hit 50+ pops. Possibly earlier if you don't take prosperity tradition as your second.

Or, alternatively, turn off guaranteed habitable worlds and see how you are struggling colonizing 20% habitability world.

Can't do the former until I buy DLC. Maybe someday.

As for the latter, I'd sign migration treaties and colonize them that way. But yeah, might not be viable early game.

 

[AlanC9]

By "not worth producing", you mean "holo-theatres aren't worth building", I assume?

Absolutely not. If you are trying to optimize your planets for maximal research and/or alloy production, not wasting space for stuff like gene clinics or commercial zones, along with colonizing all of those 60% or less habitability worlds, you need plenty of amenities. You need at least holo theatre per planet, sometimes more or upgraded. You can somewhat get around this through slavery and/or robot slavery along with the obvious civic/tradition choices, but not completely.

You got the math handy for when you do that? Using a building slot to go from 76% stability to 77% stability struck me as being silly, but I didn't do any more serious work with holo-theaters.

 

[Less2]

Remember, it's clerks plus administrators, science directors, etc. The clerks alone won't get the job done, but we weren't talking about that.

The issue is that clerks produce so little that it's almost better to kill the pop instead. Especially on lower habitability worlds, which is exactly where you need the amenities the most.

You got the math handy for when you do that? Using a building slot to go from 76% stability to 77% stability struck me as being silly, but I didn't do any more serious work with holo-theaters.

Negative amenities = really bad, avoid. Positive amenities = really wasteful, also avoid. Building holo theatres for an amenities surplus is something you should never do, but building to keep from large negatives is almost always beneficial.

I believe the way it works is that 0 amenities = -50% happiness, 100% of amenities needed (no deficit or surplus) = +0% happiness, 200% of amenities needed (e.g. pops demand 100 and you supply 200) = +20% happiness. So you can see how 2 pops providing 20 amenities to a planet that has 100 pops and is at 80/100 amenities gives a global +10% happiness which translates to (I believe) +6% production. A great deal.

 

[AlanC9]

Thanks. That's actually the rule of thumb I use, but since I'm not deactivating my clerks and am using gene clinics I never go more than 4 or so points into the red zone, so in practice I don't have to worry about holo-theaters.

 

[LeonOfOddecca]

Currently regular pops consume 4 types of resource: food, consumer goods, housing and amenities. This seems like overkill, and sometimes even overlap. For example, consumer goods are both consumed by pops and are also used for some amenities jobs, which are also consumed by pops. Thematically there is also not much difference between 'consumer goods' and 'amenities', or between 'consumer goods' and 'food' (you'd think food would count as a consumer good).

My preferred solution, however, is not to get rid of any of these resources, but to change the way consumer goods function (which might possibly require them to be renamed). Here is how all these resources currently function:

Food: global, basic (doesn't require another resource to be produced), not used in further production, habitability dependent (habitability affects how much is consumed, class independent (social class doesn't affect how much is consumed), used in decisions and edicts.

Consumer goods: global, non-basic, used in further production, habitability dependent, class dependent, used in decisions.

Housing: local, produced by buildings rather than pops, not used in further production, habitability independent, class independent.

Amenities: local, partially basic (some amenities producing jobs consume consumer goods and some don't), not used in further production, habitability dependent, class independent.

The thing about global resource consumption is that such consumption is relatively easy to meet. You only have to worry about there being enough of the relevant resource for your entire empire, and not worry about there being enough in any given place. That makes it a relatively unchallenging type of consumption. There is also no real need for there be two types of global consumption by pops (since it's unchallenging). Having said that food and consumer goods are consumed by pops in different ways. In particular, consumer goods consumption is class dependent.

Local consumption is far more interesting. Also, because amenities and housing are produced in very different ways, they present very different challenges.

With all that in mind here is a proposal for streamlining consumption by pops:

• Consumer goods are no longer consumed (directly) by pops.
• Make the consumption of amenities class dependent.
• Make amenities fully non-basic, so that all amenity producing jobs consume 'consumer goods' to varying degrees.
• Consumer goods can still be used in a decision to temporarily boost amenities in times of trouble.

I like the fact that consumer goods are this all purpose resource that is used to produce different kinds of goods (research, unity, amenities, etc). However, this role of consumer goods is muddied by them also being consumed directly by pops. It would be much neater if consumer goods were only used in further production rather than direct consumption.

 

[Zenopath]

IMO, Amenities aren't working because pops "balance" is off. Balance as Pops per building, amount of Pops per district, their production and all. And it's hard to balance in given numbers like recent nerf to Amenities for GS Empires showed. 5 Amenities per maintenance drone is OP, but 1 per 4 is very bad (partially because of how bonuses to production work). Also, normal Empire have way too many ways to produce Amenities. Also strata i messed up - Pops refuse to lower strata instantly, but worker promoted to ruler perform it's job without any penalty right from the start.

So amenities is a good idea on paper, but poorly executed as some Empire builds have way to many ways to produce them, usually alongside with other useful bonuses.

I usually end up with way too many amenities, because i have way too many clerks. I actually wouldn´t mind a civic that makes clerks produce more trade and less amenities, like, maybe:

¨Agressive Accounting¨ or ¨Hard Bargainers¨: all clerks produce 1 less amenity but produce 2 more trade. That would be a real game-changer.

 

[Vitruvian Guar]

I like the concept of amenities as they fix the old "too much happiness" problem. You know, when you stack all the +5% pop happiness modifiers and get constantly 100% happy pops no matter what.

Now most of the direct happiness modifiers can be applied indirectly via amenities. And as your population grows it requires more amenities to keep it happy, unlike happiness modifiers. So this makes the system a bit more interesting.

However, I constantly find myself with amenities abundance. So maybe an extra use for them can be good. An opposite of Distribute Luxury Goods planetary decision something like Free Public Services, decreasing amenities production and consumer goods usage on a planet.

 

[BigPony]

You can temporarily boost it via planetary decision until you get them their new holotheater to watch holo star wars in

 

[Kilmantor]

Amenities are okay as a mechanism. I like the decision "do i go amenities and unity, or amenities and research, or amenities and growspeed?".
Biggest problem I see with amenities is that its just too easy to get them. Usually 2 amenities buildings are enough per planet to get a stable 20% happieness bonus.
Pre 2.2 it was much harder to max out the happieness of your pops. They should maybe nerf some of the jobs a bit to make some buildungs more important.
For example if you specialize a planet on trade, your planet is floating in amenities as every clerk produces amenities as well - what is not really necessary imo.

 

[Typee]

Amenities are okay as a mechanism. I like the decision "do i go amenities and unity, or amenities and research, or amenities and growspeed?".
Biggest problem I see with amenities is that its just too easy to get them. Usually 2 amenities buildings are enough per planet to get a stable 20% happieness bonus.
Pre 2.2 it was much harder to max out the happieness of your pops. They should maybe nerf some of the jobs a bit to make some buildungs more important.
For example if you specialize a planet on trade, your planet is floating in amenities as every clerk produces amenities as well - what is not really necessary imo.

Not to mention it makes resort worlds and executive retreat not that exciting since you're often at the amenities cap by the time you get them.